Bright House signs deal to buy cloud provider Telovations

Bright House Networks announced this morning that it had signed an agreement to buy the business of cloud communications provider Telovations for an undisclosed sum.

Telovations, which is based in Tampa, provides businesses with hosted voice solutions, including PBX and managed SIP trunking. Using the software-as-a-service (SaaS) model, Telovations claims to be a pioneer of communications-as-a-service (CaaS). CaaS lets businesses deploy communications devices and applications on a “pay-as-you-go” model, which eliminates the need for capital investments and ongoing overhead.

"We welcome this collaborative opportunity to combine our fiber-optic network and managed services offerings with Telovations' cloud-based unified communications services to provide companies with a much broader array of network capabilities and industry-leading services," said Leo Cloutier, senior vice president of corporate strategy and business development at Bright House Networks.

With the addition of Telovations, Bright House Networks will be able to meet the needs of the enterprise market with cloud-based and managed services, as well as continue to offer small- and medium-size businesses additional services.

The transaction is expected to close within 45 to 60 days, pending regulatory approvals. Q Advisors, a Denver-, Princeton- and San Francisco-based investment banking boutique, acted as the exclusive financial advisor to Telovations.

Once the deal is closed, the Telovations team will report to Bright House Networks’ Craig Cowden, senior vice president of network engineering and operations and enterprise solutions. A spokeswoman for Bright House Networks said the Telovations portfolio would be used across the company’s Florida, Alabama, Indiana, Michigan and California systems.

"We are thrilled to be joining Bright House Networks, as we share a common passion for serving customers," said Mark Swanson, co-founder and CEO of Telovations. "The combination of Telovations' innovative cloud-based unified communications offerings and Bright House's fiber network and broader portfolio of managed services will provide customers some of the most advanced business communications capabilities in the nation."

Bright House Networks is the sixth-largest cable operator in the nation and the second largest in Florida.